Background
- In addition to being very similar experiences by many accounts, boarding schools and the current disproportionate incarceration of Native peoples are deeply intertwined through cycles of trauma and abuse.
- Centuries of colonial projects damaged cultural identities, kinship systems, and family structures. Prior to the U.S. government’s policies of extermination, removal, and assimilation, Indigenous peoples had (& still have) forms of governance and ways of being rooted in systems of kinship.
- For many Native peoples, these expansive and inclusive kinship networks created safety nets of relatives, which prevented abuse, isolation, and neglect-- which are hallmarks of carceral experiences.
- The creation and implementation of reservations can be seen as a form of mass Native incarceration in itself as it was against the will of many, and people were initially not allowed to leave reservation boundaries at all without passes signed by Indian Agents.[1]
- Further policies seeking to further erode Native land bases strained kinship dynamics further. The Dawes Act or General Allotment Act of 1887, for instance, divided up many reservations under individual (versus communal) ownership with men as heads of nuclear families.
Families & the Boarding School Experience
- During seemingly unending times of harship, Native families did what they could to keep and care for their children at home.
- A particularly moving example comes from a Hopi community in Arizona who, when faced with the threat of having their children taken, instead chose to sacrifice a group of men to the military, who later imprisoned them at Alcatraz.[2]
- Schools often used threats or methods of coersion in order to bring in children. Others advocated outright abduction. [3]
- Other families were so devastated by epidemics and economic hardship that they wrote to boarding school administrations asking that their child(ren) might attend so that they may live.[2]
Making The Cycle - Boarding School Trauma
I never bonded with any parental figures in my home. At seven years old, I could be gone for days at a time and no one would look for me....I’ve never been to a boarding school....all of the abuse we’ve talked about happened in my home. If it had happened by strangers, it wouldn’t have been so bad- the sexual abuse, the neglect. Then, I could blame it all on another race....And, yes, they [my parents] went to boarding school. -A Lakota Parent in Recovery[4]
- Many Indian boarding schools were abusive as a rule. In addition to having no loving caregivers, were punished harshly and readily.
- Some schools even made older children beat younger children for discipline.[5]
- Most incarcerated women are survivors of violence.[6]
- There are wide-spread accounts of both physical and sexual abuses throughout many boarding schools. It is believed by some that the religious institutions "sent their worst" to work in these places in many cases i.e. people who had histories of perpetrating abuse against children.
- These allegations continued beyond boarding schools into B.I.A. school where federal inquiries found decades of negligence in background checking employees, and neglect to investigate or report on-going sexual abuse within these institutions.[7]
- The combination of varying levels of abuse, attacks on identity, and removal from the experience of having a loving family created a wide range of lasting issues for many of these children, who later had children of their own.
Intergenerational Trauma & Disproportionate Incarceration
- Native American's experience both trauma and incarceration at among the highest rates of any ethnic group in the country.
- Native American's experience violent victimization at the highest rate in the country-- More than twice the national per capita rate.
- From 2009 to 2013, the number of Native Americans in federal prisons raised by 27% [8]
- Native Americans are incarcerated at a rate about 38% higher than the national average.[8]
- Native American's experience violent victimization at the highest rate in the country-- More than twice the national per capita rate.
- Native women experience specific carceral issues, such as extremely high sex trafficking rates.
Native Families as Resistance
- Studies believe that it is the strong kinship networks and extended-family dynamics that have helped Native families endure centuries of trauma from genocidal and assimilatory policies.[10]
- In the boarding school era it was the extended family group that assisted children in becoming reacclimated to life in their home communities once their schooling ended. [11]
- Native parents are also more likely to have assistance from relatives to care for their children while incarcerated than are parents of other backgrounds. [12]
Further Reading
Sources
[1] Ross, Luana. Inventing the Savage: The Social Construction of Native American Criminality. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998.
[2] Brenda J. Child. Boarding School Seasons: American Indian Families, 1900-1940. U of Nebraska Press, 1998.
[3] Deer, Sarah. The Beginning and End of Rape: Confronting Sexual Violence in Native America. University of Minnesota Press, 2011.
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[8]http://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/research-and-publications/quick-facts/Quick_Facts_Native_American_Offenders.pdf
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[1] Ross, Luana. Inventing the Savage: The Social Construction of Native American Criminality. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998.
[2] Brenda J. Child. Boarding School Seasons: American Indian Families, 1900-1940. U of Nebraska Press, 1998.
[3] Deer, Sarah. The Beginning and End of Rape: Confronting Sexual Violence in Native America. University of Minnesota Press, 2011.
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[8]http://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/research-and-publications/quick-facts/Quick_Facts_Native_American_Offenders.pdf
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